Awake Before Rising
by leave me light
Summary: A Sparky story that uses Rising as a springboard and then takes off for the open skies on a somewhat wacky idea...
1. Chapter 1

She stormed into the General's makeshift office, a million checklists, itineraries and timetables whizzing through her mind and more than a little annoyed at being summoned there now.

"You wanted to see me?"she asked, barely a step in the door, hoping that whatever this was could be handled quickly. Taking in the whole space with a quick glance, she noticed the Major standing a bit sheepishly a few feet to the left of her. If her mind hadn't been on everything else, she might have realized how odd their mutual presence at that very moment was. Right now, getting out of there as swiftly as possible was just another item on just another one of those checklists.

"Yes," General O'Neill said, rubbing his brow in obvious discomfort, "could you please come in and close the door?"

"Is this going to take long?" she inquired, taking note of the somewhat unbecoming impatience in her voice. Sure, she had been his boss before he became hers and no one had more contempt for unnecessary formality than the General, but right now the Major was also here and she wasn't about to weaken Jack's authority in front of his subordinates. So she shut the door behind her without turning around and went on to explain, hoping that this would soften the impact of her initial attacking manner, "It's just that the scheduled take-off is in less than an hour and I've still got to check…"

"Believe me, I know," O'Neill sighed again. "If there was any way we could avoid… The point is, this can't…," he was clearly having difficulties addressing whatever it was that was so important that she (and the Major also, she realized, turning to him and nodding, acknowledging his presence; he returned the nod, for some reason accompanying it with a slightly embarrassed scowl) had to be dragged out of last minute preparations. "Correct me if I am wrong," he finally gathered himself, "but I distinctly remember both of you telling me that you had never met each other before?"

The two people addressed threw a confused look at each other before mumbling their affirmation.

"Yeah, well, I've got a little piece of something here that begs to differ," the General frowned, picking up a Xerox of what looked like some sort of a diploma. At a complete loss of ideas both Elizabeth and the Major leaned in to get a better look at it. And jumped back almost instantaneously, now avoiding all possible eye contact with each other.

"License of Marriage" read in large italicized print on top of the copy. "Clark County, Nevada" was printed under it, in somewhat smaller letters.

"Well, obviously, that's not real," Elizabeth quickly scoffed once she got her voice back. "Somebody is clearly trying to sabotage the expedition. I mean, obviously, Jack, it's impossible…"

"Khmm," the Major coughed from somewhere to her left. She still wasn't feeling composed enough to look. "I mean, Sir," and she could hear that embarrassed scowl in his voice again, "it's very unlikely, yes, but…" he sighed, trying to find the words, "as far as I am concerned, at least, Sir, it's, strictly speaking, not impossible…"

That shocked her enough to make her forget her own composure issues. She snapped around, looking at him incredulously. Who was this man?!

"It's just that, at that particular weekend, I _was_ in Las Vegas…" he reached his hand to his nape and did a pretty good job at making an even bigger mess of his hair than it already was.

"You remember what you did on a random weekend, what…," she glanced back at the offending paper to catch the date on it, "ten years ago?"

"I remember what I did on that weekend, yes," he nodded. "Or at least, what I did most of that weekend. That's the week my divorce came through." He shrugged, as if to apologize for allowing this ludicrous misconception any ground.

"You celebrated your divorce by getting married, Major?" the General piped in, seemingly forgetting for a moment his role in all this and how difficult these two potential morons in front of him were making his life. If this ended up postponing the Atlantis expedition or, God forbid, getting it canceled… Well, it was safe to say heads were going to roll…

"It's starting to look that way, Sir, isn't it?" John let out a bitter laugh. Leave it to him to screw up the biggest thing in his life. It was all getting to be too good anyway… Oh, well, back to the igloos for him…

The General just shook his head, still desperately searching for a way to disprove this whole mess. "Doctor?" he yanked his head impatiently. "Care to pitch in here?"

Elizabeth's eyes were transfixed on the date printed on the license. This had to be some sort of a cruel joke. After all, what could she have possibly been doing in Vegas? And how could she have been married for the last ten years without even knowing it? Or remembering the wedding? Or the man she was married to, for that matter? Impossible. Completely unlike her. I mean, I would remember not remembering, right? the incoherent thought made its way to her mind. This would have meant that she'd be missing at least a whole night, maybe more, of her life… Of all the unsuitable times for something this preposterous to pop up…

"Elizabeth?" O'Neill addressed her again. "Anything? I mean, does the signature look like yours? What?"

She slid her glance down the paper. Whoever had put this hoax together had done a really good job at forging her signature. It looked exactly like hers. But it couldn't have been hers. Ten years ago she was…

"Oh, God…," she suddenly let out a completely unguarded moan. That managed to instantaneously gain her the full attention of both men in the room. She hung her head and slowly wiped her palm across her face. Ten years ago. "The Application of Game Theory by Third Party Mediators in Civil Conflicts." Her first Doctorate.

"I defended my PhD thesis that week," she said in resignation, as if that might explain everything, and looked up, first at John, instinctually, then, realizing her tactical mistake, quickly at the General. He just raised his eyebrows, indicating for her to elaborate. "I had been pretty much a wound up paranoid nervous wreck for the six months leading up to that, coming out of the library only to talk to my 

instructor and take an occasional shower. So after I passed, my friends all but bound and gagged me and dragged me off to Vegas. Where, after I got over the initial distaste, the semester of chaste life and fresh air deprivation kind of got the best of me…," she trailed off.

"In other words, what you are saying is that this," O'Neill waved the sheet of paper furiously in the air, "might very well be the real thing?"

"I suppose," she sighed. "There was that one morning when I woke up in my own hotel bed with no recollection of how I got there and a monster of a headache…"

"Yup," John mumbled. "Sounds familiar…"

The silence that took over the office was so tense that all three practically jumped when it was penetrated by the sound of something heavy being dragged towards the gate room along the hallway behind the door.

"Damn, Elizabeth," the General contended. "That's a story even I have trouble topping. Not to mention a hell of a bureaucratic nightmare. I mean, if the good Major here is married to the expedition leader, how am I supposed to let the two of you step across that event horizon?"

Elizabeth glanced quickly at her watch. T minus 40 minutes. An impressive list of profanities streaked across her mind while she tried to will herself into a state of cool reason.

"I don't really think this is going to be a problem, General," she said, noting that she sounded a lot more certain than she felt. "I mean, if this really is true. And, based on a few facts correlating and this poor photocopy, we can't really definitively say it is. I am still quite confident that, even if I was somewhat inebriated that evening, I wouldn't completely forget marrying someone…"

"Yes, but it is starting to look more and more like this is true, wouldn't you say?" the General's voice was dripping with bitter sarcasm. "And, if that is the case, I don't really see how this isn't going to be a problem, Doctor."

"Okay, so it might become a bit of a problem," she admitted, in what the diplomat in her considered a tactical retreat. "But seeing that Major Sheppard is not under my direct command but Colonel Sumner's and seeing the nature of this operation… I mean, provided that we do get to take off in 38 minutes, it might just mean that in two hours we are all dead," and she did realize that the triumphant grin that she wasn't able to contain, brought about by such successful thinking on her feet, was somewhat at odds with the grimness of what she was implying, "might I just suggest that we postpone resolving this issue till the next time? Should there even be a next time, of course."

"The Major here," the General replied, and John was slightly perturbed by the fact that the two of them were talking about him as if he wasn't even there, "is the second in the line of command on Atlantis, so should Sumner somehow become incapacitated and the big shots somehow find out that I knew about your… situation," he winced, "and let you skip off to Atlantis anyway, it's my head on the plate, you do realize that?"

"What could possibly happen to Sumner?" Elizabeth tried a desperate line of discourse. Even John couldn't help but snort, earning himself a death glare from his potentially former future boss. "You're really not helping," was what her eyes seemed to yell at him. But the General wasn't that thick either.

"Excuse me, but wasn't it you that just a minute ago was merrily introducing me the possible positive outcome of all of you being dead in two hours?" he asked, almost laughing at the preposterousness of the whole argument.

"Sir?" John felt that this was the moment to make his last-ditch effort to try and dig them out of this predicament. The way he saw it, it was he who had the most to lose here.

"Major?" the General nodded at him.

"Well, Sir, in the event that the Colonel won't keel over the moment we hit the Pegasus galaxy," he knew that with his choice of vocabulary he was betting heavily on the camaraderie that the two Air Force officers would have shared as opposed to their feelings about the Colonel, a Marine, "and the issue of powering the intergalactic wormhole will remain the way it is…" he was referring to the fact that all things were pointing towards this being a one-way trip for the members of the expedition, "I don't really see what practical problems might arise from this. For any of us," he added, for good measure.

"So you want me to bet my ass on the happy chance that you might never establish contact with Earth again?" O'Neill asked, clearly getting more amused by the absurdity. "Sheesh, with all these hopeless optimists on the expedition team, I can't see how it could possibly fail…"

"Sir, what I am saying is that whatever might or might not have happened took place ten years ago, we have not had any contact since and have now worked pretty close together for quite some time without even an ounce of recognition. I think it's safe to say that this is all just a mishap that we can clear up the next chance we get. But as long as no one on Atlantis knows about this – and if there is no contact with Earth, I don't see how they would find out – in practical terms it would make no difference."

"In practical terms, Major, the easiest solution would be to just drop you from the expedition and commandeer your ass back to McMurdo," the General scoffed. In anticipation of Elizabeth's next argument, he continued, "Yes, I know, Doctor, he has the magical touch with the Ancient doohickeys, you need him, yadayada…"

He looked sternly from one to the other, trying hard to consolidate his conscience with his survival instincts. "And, considering that this kind of a completely irresponsible… what did you call it?... mishap has already taken place once with you Major, who's to say that it won't happen again? How can I be sure that you are not some sort of a serial…? What's the word?" he turned to Elizabeth for help.

"Deuterogamist," she absentmindedly said, not even noticing the impressed, yet slightly worried look possessing that kind of knowledge earned her from both men.

"I have only been married once, Sir," John replied to the General's question, being forced to add, "maybe twice…," as an afterthought.

"That you know of, Major," the General pointed out. Taking another look at the two people sweating it out in front of him, he let out a resigned sigh. This was his call, after all, and he really thought that both of them deserved to go. But they were clearly only kidding themselves if they thought this would be easy. "Look, guys," he finally said, switching to a more informal tone, "there was obviously something that got the two of you together that time. And if that something is still there then it would be really naïve to hope that the whole chain of command thing will somehow keep it at bay. Take it from someone who knows."

"General," Elizabeth quipped, clearly noticing the change in her superior's demeanor, "I have seen drunk people who thought that the lamp post was their soul mate. I wouldn't really read anything into that one colossal drunken mistake of a night." John glanced at her from the corner of his eye, trying to determine if he should be hurt at being considered as lovable as a lamp post, but decided to let it go for the time being.

"Yes, yes," now an almost fatherly smile was playing on the General's lips, "but don't say I didn't warn you." For the first time during this whole conversation John was allowing a ray of hope reach him again.

"Fine," O'Neill finally relented, "I'm letting you can both retain your jobs and I will do my best to keep this juvenile mess of yours under wraps until you get back here and solve it." He took the photocopy of the marriage license and fed it into the paper wolf. "I'm not promising anything, mind you."

"Thank you, Jack," Elizabeth muttered, while John simply accompanied his sharp nod with a "Sir!"

"Oh, go on then," he impatiently dismissed them. "I'm sure you still have last minute things to take care of. I will see you at the gate room in fifteen."

Making their way down the hallway, John stole a quick glance at Elizabeth, mentally restraining himself from fully forming in his head the thought that it was his wife he was looking at.

"This is…," he started, not quite knowing how to acknowledge the situation.

"Later, Major," she quickly put him in place. "Provided that there is one." They took another few steps in tense silence. Then a tiny smirk fought its way to the corners of his lips.

"Do you suppose we...?" he started to ask, but was deterred by Elizabeth snapping her head up to throw him a razor-sharp stare.

"I would be really careful with what I was going to say if I were you, Major," she hissed.

"Sorry," he shrugged somewhat sheepishly, but then had to turn his face to the wall to hide his smirk. Oh, how was this not going to be easy…

She had to admit the same when, a little while later, she found herself fighting a blush that was completely unbecomingly making its way up her face. The huge bottle of champagne that quietly rolled through the gate after them, bearing the best wishes from the General, was just the kind of underhanded sneaky juvenile stab that she should have learned to expect from Jack by now…

TBC


	2. Elephants on Atlantis

"I don't understand how you can be so calm about all this, Major?" Elizabeth supported both knuckles on the edge of the console and pushed down on them in apprehension. Seeing her all tense and wide-eyed made John feel distinctly uncomfortable. And quite frankly, a bit surprised. He had seen this woman balancing the fate of the whole expedition, city and quite possibly the galaxy in her palms and never waver. But now they were here, in this dim recently uncovered lab and she was all twisted up and he realized that, by some sheer miracle, they had actually survived to "Later" and all of the sudden the prospect of establishing their own personal… "situation" didn't seem all that appealing to him. He raked his fingers through his hair in absentminded frustration.

"So we're back to that now? Please – it's John. I think this is all awkward enough without the titles."

"You think anything I could possibly call you is going to make it not be awkward?" she snapped nervously, immediately noticing the inappropriateness of her reaction from the way John smirked at her from across the lab. And she had to admit that she was somewhat intrigued by the fact that her barking did not intimidate but amused him. She hadn't noticed any underlying authority issues between them in professional situations, otherwise she might have found cause for worry in this apparent lack of reverence in this man that had tragically quickly been forced to become her second in command. But in this case, she realized, it was only fair that she relented a bit. "Fine – John."

"Great, Elizabeth. Do I get to graduate to some further level?" his smirk widened. "Liz? Lizzie?" he raised his left eyebrow, "Beth?"

"You can consider yourself graduated," Elizabeth shook her head in exasperation, though one corner of her mouth inched treacherously slightly upwards.

"If you say so," John nodded. "Now, you were saying…?"

"No, I was just surprised at how flippantly you are taking this," she now pushed her chin up and threw him a challenging look.

"I'm not taking it flippantly," he explained, leaning casually against the wall. "I just make it a point not to lose any sleep over things I can do nothing about. You know just as well as I that absolutely nothing can change until we reestablish contact with Earth. So the question here is why are you so worked up about it?" And Elizabeth watched the challenge bounce right back to her and hit her in between the eyes. Before she could even think of an answer she noticed a worrisome glint in his stare.

"Aha!" he pushed himself off the wall and took a few steps closer to her, pointing his finger at her jubilantly. "That's it, isn't it? It's completely out of your control?" In anything else, even if it seemed hopelessly doomed, she could grasp at straws and thrash about and do _something_. In this, she could only wait.

"So you don't find this whole being married for ten years without even knowing about it one bit disconcerting?" she narrowed her eyes at him in disbelief.

"Of course I do, but I still don't see how a nervous breakdown would help the matter," John shrugged.

"I am not having a nervous breakdown," she announced. "It just seems to me that you are not taking this whole thing seriously."

He came to stand directly across the console from her and placed his hands on it as well, inadvertently making a few scattered crystals on it flicker, adding another degree of accusation into Elizabeth's glare. "Showoff," her eyes seemed to say. John jumped slightly and quickly lifted his hands. The flicker stopped. "Damn. That still freaks me out a bit… Feels like I am part of the machine, or something," he muttered, staring at his palms for a few long moments.

"I am taking it seriously," he finally continued, fixing his stare firmly on her. "From what I gather, you know, having had to shoot my superior officer and all, life in the whole damn galaxy seems to be intent on pretty serious. We have jobs to do – risk our lives, risk other people's lives… Serious stuff all." He paused, tilting his head a bit. "This?" he gestured between them. "This is irrelevant. If we make this so damn deadly serious as well it will become just another burden weighing us down and in the end we will hate each other for it. And that would suck, not only because I kind of like you, Elizabeth, but it could also bring the city down."

It was Elizabeth who broke the eye contact, casting her glance down at her hands and biting her lower lip. "You're right," she sighed.

"Come again?" he leaned his ear closer to her over the console.

"You heard me," she snapped her head back up, trying really hard to be annoyed at him.

"It's killing you to admit it, though, isn't it?" he flashed a toothy flyboy grin at her.

"John?" she slowly arched her eyebrows. "Don't push it."

He raised his hands in mock reverence and Elizabeth couldn't help but smile, wondering whether letting him get away with this kind of complete disregard for her authority would at some point come back to bite her.

"Look, all I am saying is that," his tone was suddenly a few degrees heavier, "I meant what I said to O'Neill. This does not have to be a problem unless we make it a problem. Unless we decide to be bothered by it. So, I suggest that we take it a bit lighter."

"John," she was suddenly wary again, "I really hope that I don't have to remind you how important it is that this matter stays strictly between the two of us?"

"At which point exactly did I give you the impression that I am a moron?" he asked, appearing genuinely hurt. "I am the one who assured the General that no one on Atlantis would ever know, remember?"

"I'm sorry," and she really was, "it's just that it's…"

"I know. Important." He stuffed his hands in his pockets and winced. "What I meant was that this is our chance to laugh about it, to make it our private little joke. From what the first few weeks here have taught me, these kinds of chances might not come about as often as we'd like to."

John did realize that all this was still too new, too unbelievable to be comfortable. Not only the bit about them being married, but also the reception they got from Pegasus. The fact that they had only narrowly survived; the fact that the Colonel had, indeed, keeled over; the fact that they were now established in this marvelous city that they, nevertheless, had no control over; the fact that tomorrow could bring anything – really, the flying-elephants/pixie-dust kind of anything. He really, really wanted to help this beautiful strong woman in her job, but in order for that to become possible they somehow had to find a way to clubber this particular flying elephant in the room into submission. And if I must throw on a clown costume and do the funny dance for that to happen, he thought, well, just point me towards the giant shoes…

There was a defiant frown on Elizabeth's face when she spoke again. "We were so drunk that we lost an entire night of our lives during which we managed to make a stupid decision with lifelong consequences. That's not really funny, John."

"No," he admitted. "But it could be. Anything can be funny if you're open enough. Trust me." She had to understand. She had to know him that much by now.

"Trust you?" Elizabeth tilted her head and he realized that she really wanted to.

"Yeah, humor me this once." And suddenly the conversation was just as much about what was not being said as about what was. Their youthful indiscretions were one matter, but this was also about her responsibilities or what she thought her responsibilities were and how much she was willing to share and lean on others. That's where she had to trust. That's where he had to prove to be trustworthy. Apparently over and over again until it stuck. He saw the hesitation in her, that tiny moment of unguarded loss and vulnerability and realized that this could only have happened because she already did. Whether she herself was aware of it or not.

Elizabeth let out a deep breath. "Oh, I don't see how this could possibly get any worse, really, so I am willing to be "open enough"." She clearly wasn't, but at least she was admitting that she should try to be. "The moment this even appears to be getting out of hand, though…"

"Come on, Elizabeth," he now dared to tease her, a wide smile stretching his face. "Who'd even believe this – that by sheer coincidence the two leaders of the mission got married ten years ago and didn't even know about it until half an hour before liftoff? I am apparently one of the two and I still have trouble believing it."

She didn't say anything, just looked at him and the smile on her face reached all the way into her eyes, making them shine in this strange half-light and he couldn't be quite sure, but John thought he even saw some gratitude in there somewhere. He went back to the wall and hoisted himself casually up to sit on a counter.

"So, have you ever been married?" he asked. Elizabeth looked down at his merrily dangling feet and wondered whether she had managed to miss some crucial turn in their conversation. Coming up empty, she raised her head in unmistakable confusion. "Before," he specified. "Have you ever been married before?"

"No," she shook her head. "I have two PhD's and I am the head of an intergalactic expedition," she somehow felt the need to spell out. "I have never been married."

"You should try it," John insisted, attempting to make his facial expression match the expert advice he was doling out. She wasn't buying it.

"Aren't you divorced?" she asked, folding her arms.

"Yeah," he sighed, looking down. "Don't try it the way I did…" The melancholy was short-lived, though, because the next moment his head shot up again, revealing a Cheshire-cat grin. "Got right back on the horse, though," he contended and Elizabeth found her reactions completely failing her – her mouth dragged out in a wide smile that she really thought he didn't deserve while she had to squeeze her hands under her armpits in order to stop herself from smacking him. She tried to convey her true feelings by squinting at him, only earning a challenging arch of an eyebrow. She did say she was willing to be open.

"This one seems to be a success story, though," he continued toying with his fate, "it has already lasted three times as long as my last did so we must be doing something right."

"Yes," she now piped in, "this one is a keeper, John. The way things are going, this is the best we'll ever do." She did realize that the pleasure she derived from the confusion spreading itself across John's face was entirely petty.

"What are you talking about, Elizabeth?"

"I'm talking about the fact that any notion of a real marriage is now on hold, indefinitely. Possibly for good. So if you happen to find a nice alien girl for yourself from out there at some point, that's what you have to explain to her – that you are already married and there's no way out of it because the phone lines to the divorce court are dead."

"Oh, that's ok," he flippantly dismissed her scare-tactics, "I don't think I'm the marrying type anyway."

"Now you're telling me?" Elizabeth snorted, making John realize what he had just said and promptly fall down from the counter, laughing. Picking himself up, he glanced at her approvingly from the corner of his eye and went to whip the ten thousand years worth of dust off his knees.

"You're good!" he had to admit.

"Don't forget it," she beamed down at him smugly.

"Seriously, though," John said, standing up straight again in front of her. "It would be a shame if this," he gestured between them, "has screwed up your chance." He did seem to be serious for a change. "It's not all hard work and compromises, even if I sometimes forget that myself. The way this happened for us – you were cheated out of some great stuff," he looked at her, not in sympathy (which she somehow would have expected but definitely would have considered patronizing) but in regret (like this was all his fault). "You deserve better."

TBC


	3. Sowing the Seeds

She watched him walk towards her carrying a tree. A very small gangly tree in a pretty clay flower pot, but a tree nonetheless and, try as she might, she failed to find any possible context for this sight. Just out of educated caution she stepped back into her office when he was about to reach her and John followed a few steps behind, closing the door behind him.

Setting the pot on her desk, he flashed a triumphant grin at her. "For you," he gestured. "Nice, huh? Looks like one of those Japanese contortions that they bend and pluck, but this one here is very low maintenance. The guy at the nursery told me that it's a pygmy and all you have to do is remember to water it once in a while."

As her confused look apparently failed to be enough of a clue for him, she had to probe, "Why?"

"Weren't you paying attention in Biology class?" he asked. "It'll die otherwise. I could invite one of your hotshot scientists to come and explain the details of this whole circle of life thing if you want."

"No," she couldn't even be bothered to leer at him for his obviously intentional obtuseness. "Why are you giving it to me?"

"Ouch," he dramatically grabbed the left side of his chest. "Don't tell me that you forgot?"

"Forgot what?" Now she was getting worried. Not because she actually feared she had forgotten something important, but because his theatrics were a sure sign that John was out to somehow get her embarrassed.

He knocked on the table calendar that was carelessly squished between the various items cluttering her desk. Here, where the days were longer and the seasons yet to be determined, a calendar reflecting the passing of time on Earth had little day to day relevance. Except, it seemed, now.

"Our tenth wedding anniversary," he deadpanned loudly and wished he had had the sense to bring along a camera to capture the look of utter horror and panic that took hold of her. After allowing Elizabeth several failed attempts to say something, he relented.

"Oh, relax! Soundproof glass, remember?" he smirked at her. "Though I am pretty sure that there are a few computer geeks behind me who think that I have just burned your precious dictionaries or something. I expect to hear the dull thuds of them rushing to your rescue any moment now."

"You evil, manipulative…,"she hissed, but the helpless grin on her face robbed the angry burst of its credibility.

"That's a bit ungrateful, don't you think?" he pouted in mock indignation. "After all the trouble I went through to get you that pretty abomination of a tree. I even picked the kind that you can forget to water for days on end. Would have brought you a puppy, but I was afraid you'd forget to water it too."

"For your information," she announced huffily, "I am an excellent dog owner."

"Yes," John tilted his head playfully, "now that I think about it, I bet you are."

She looked up at him, prepared to be slightly mortified again. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Oh," grinning, he just shook his head, "nothing…"

"Good," Elizabeth sighed in relief, having realized a moment too late that she really, really did not want to know what he had meant. "Well, thank you. For the tree." She slipped her palm over the springy stubborn branches.

"You're welcome," he magnanimously allowed, before giving into the temptation to get in another stab. "You really are the man in this relationship, aren't you? Work through dinner, forget the anniversary…" He narrowed his eyes and adopted a slightly whiny tone, "I expect at least a wilted bunch of flowers and some cheap perfume by way of apology."

"Really?" she asked. "That is your interpretation of "Woman in this relationship"?" She knew full well how dangerous it was to indulge him. And how wrong. But it was also so ridiculously easy, in a way not many things were these days. Now he looked at her as if she was sucking all the fun out of his life and Elizabeth had to suppress a billowing giggle, deciding to play along. "Where am I supposed to get you wilted flowers on Atlantis?"

"Right," he quipped and the diplomat in her had to give him props for the way his tone of voice completely managed to ignore the fact that he had just admitted to his demands having been impossible to fulfill. "Then…"

"Yes?" she was almost afraid to look at him, wary of what he would come up with next.

"Dinner," he threw her an obvious challenge. "Really good dinner. Na-ha," John admonished when she started to protest. "You owe me. This is not any ordinary anniversary. Ten years, that's like… a whole decade," he had to stop for a moment and bite his lower lip to keep himself from bursting into laughter and from the corner of his eye he could see, to his tremendous satisfaction, that Elizabeth was barely containing her amusement as well. "So, pick me up at eight."

Walking out of her office he gave a reassuring smile to the few technicians eyeing him suspiciously. "It's alright," he said, waving his hand dismissively, "she just found out about Santa… Give her a few moments."

x-x-x

The dinner part about this is alright, she thought. The dinner part about this wasn't even that unusual because she did have the tendency to work through it unless he came and personally dragged her off to the mess hall. And dinner, after all, was just some shared food.

Everything else about this was a glaringly obvious trap, though. She couldn't even tell how or when exactly the dynamics of their interactions had shifted, but now she often felt like she was treading on quicksand and all that unpredictability was making her abnormally giddy. Oh, she was perfectly able to talk strategy with him, threaten him with disciplinary action or keep a cool head in arguments over the division of power, labor or competencies. But there was always this unfamiliar undercurrent there, this bond that only got stronger with the secret they staunchly guarded from the rest of the world and more confusing because of the substance of that secret and at moments like this, when she allowed herself to think about it, she became scared that at some point, when she was too distracted to pay attention, that undercurrent would just sweep her out to the open sea.

It had worked for them in the beginning, she was sure about that. It had eased them into the part of their lives they had to share, even if it had been a little awkward, a little desperate at first. The barely noticeable stabs and the apologetic looks on their faces after that, carefully prodding the boundaries. It had been good to know that they were alright, that they were both aware how important it was to be alright. But the fact that they actually liked each other, that they, in all likelihood, would have been alright even without the Humor Pact, had completely ambushed her and she was sure that if John had actually stopped to think about all this for a second, he would have realized that it had caught him off guard as well. So now they were stuck in this vortex of a shared joke that was dangerously gathering momentum and at the same time there was this huge empty space between their professional relationship and this precariously flirtatious banter that had grown out of the gradual realization that there really were no clearly defined boundaries. They had never really managed to become friends.

That's probably why the ground was shifting. She was never quite sure where she was standing with him.

And now? Tenth anniversary dinner? Despite the casual manner with which they had arrived to this (oh, who was she kidding, she was glad she had managed to tag along across that obstacle course; it was pretty much John alone who had done the arriving), it had every potential of going tragically wrong.

Elizabeth sighed and pressed on her earpiece, "John?"

"Mhmm?" a reply came in a few seconds, absentminded, as if he was concentrated on something else.

"Con… What are you doing?" she couldn't help but be suspicious.

She heard John chuckle, "You'll see. Is my carriage awaiting?"

"Consider yourself picked up," she announced. "I am not going to risk getting caught sneaking around near your living quarters just to satisfy your crazy whim."

"So where am I supposed to escort myself?"

"The balcony overlooking the eastern pier."

"Smart choice," she could hear the approval in his voice. "Away from… well, everything." The connection cut off in the middle of his next hearty chuckle.

"What?" she snapped into her earpiece.

"Oh, nothing," words that always made her wary when coming from him. "I was just picturing… Let's just hope that I won't meet much traffic on the way there."

"John?" she really hoped that the warning was explicit in her voice. He became cranky whenever she spelled it out, from the very first time.

"Relax, Elizabeth. It's nothing. See you there."

TBC


	4. Real turkey

"God!"

"Just call me John," he smirked while the balcony door swished closed behind him. The boyish grin that her gratifyingly shocked reaction elicited was almost contagious.

"Where did you get that?" she reached out her hand. "Don't tell me that you brought a bow tie with you?"

Because that was indeed that he was proudly wearing around his neck. On top of his long-sleeved polo neck tee. A shiny black silk bow tie.

"It's Zelenka's actually," John chuckled. "Don't ask me why he thought it necessary to bring one. I just find it interesting that Radek of all people decided to go old school." He fingered the corner of the tie and tried to look down at it. "Tying this thing was a science all to itself. That's why I couldn't take it off for the trip. Once I managed to get it on -- with the help of an amazingly long set of detailed instructions and pictograms -- there was no way I was going to take it off again."

She smiled, being reminded of a long line of his idiotic tricks that always danced on that fine line between making her angry and making her laugh. "For the sake of my own sanity I am not going to even ask how you happened to know that he had this thing and what reason you gave him for needing to borrow it."

"Oh, I think Radek is a romantic enough to understand and a gentleman enough to not ask," he dismissed happily but Elizabeth could see that he was actually relieved. It was strange, all the devices they used in order for it not to be awkward between them and how, for a moment, it still was, mostly because of these very same tricks, and then it suddenly wasn't. For how could you not meet half way the person who was willing to make such a fool of himself just so you would feel better?

"Well, you are looking very sharp," she nodded approvingly and reached out to straighten his tie, dragging out the corners and smoothing it down in the end.

"Let no one say that John Sheppard can't dress up properly when the occasion calls for it," he said and suddenly his crooked smile was so close to her that she had to take a step back. He didn't seem to notice. "Do I smell…?"

"Yes, turkey sandwiches." She stepped out of his way to reveal the spread she had created.

"Real turkey?" it was now his turn to wonder about her resourcefulness. "Not some Athosian creature that is actually more like a cross between a sparrow and a Labrador, but when you look at the meat from the right angle it sort of reminds you of turkey?"

"Yes, real deep frozen, laser-thawed, god-knows-how-old-but-who-cares-cause-it's-real turkey."

"Mmmm," he was eager like a three-year-old. "Soulfood." She couldn't help but laugh out loud. "Do you have an in with some kind of a secret illegal intergalactic smuggling ring?" he asked, squinting at her in suspicion.

"No. And there's no point in trying to sweet-talk me into procuring some for you after tonight. This was the last of the last of it."

"Yeah," he leaned towards her accusingly. "Meanwhile I have been told time and again during the past months how there is really, no really, not a strip of turkey on this whole boat…"

"John?" she tilted her head. "Are you saying that your integrity won't allow you to eat my sandwiches?"

"God, no! What integrity? What are you talking about, woman? Why are we still standing here wasting good turkey sandwich eating time? " he spluttered, guiding her quickly towards the table-like ledge in the corner of the balcony and sitting her down on one of the folding chairs she had transported there. The moment he had taken a seat himself, there was half a sandwich in his mouth and crumbs all over his fancy tie and the front of his black shirt.

"Of course you did pretty much blackmail me into providing this dinner," she said, handing him a napkin. "I thought we agreed that you'd stop trying to give me a heart attack?"

John swallowed hard so that he wouldn't sprinkle her with bread crumbs when he spoke. "In order for that to happen," he explained, at the same time pouring the dark frothy Athosian root beer into their glasses, "you have to stop being so easily heart attackable."

"I am not…," she tried to show that his suggestion was utterly ridiculous, but he cut in.

"Elizabeth, I get you with a variation of the same thing every single time," he laughed and she knew that he was mocking her, but there was something so warmly familiar, so reassuring in that laughter that she didn't really have the willpower to mind. "When will you finally accept that I am not out to blow our cover? That I would never do something like that to you?"

Her hands dropped in her lap and she gave John a long contemplative look. He was right, in a way. They were behaving like kids, like beginners, like there was no tomorrow. And though there was always the chance that there wouldn't be, it still wasn't much of an excuse.

"It's…" she began.

"Important, yes," he impatiently cut in again, but this time she didn't let herself to be deterred.

"John, would you please let me finish, for once?" she snapped and he winced in apology, indicating with his hand for her to speak. "Thank you," Elizabeth gave him a sarcastic nod. "What I wanted to say was that I think it's time we stopped this fooling around."

"Why?" he was suddenly all alert, setting his sandwich down and sitting up straighter. "You don't like it? Am I making you feel uncomfortable? Why didn't you say something before?"

She raised her hand to make the barrage of questions stop. This was going all wrong. "No… I mean, yes, sometimes, but that's not what I meant," she gave him an awkward smile and took a sip from her cup. John waited for her to continue, a worried look still creasing his forehead. Somehow she seemed to be unable to turn this conversation to the right direction. She tried again, "I guess "stopped" is not exactly the right word…" She was looking at him a bit helplessly, striving to figure out what the right word was. Finally she let out a deep breath and smiled, realizing full well that it did not help John's confusion any.

"Elizabeth, I'd really like to say or do something to make this right, but you're going to have to be a bit more specific than this…," he leaned towards her and instinctually reached out his hand across the table.

"I know, John. I'm sorry," she briefly touched his palm and smiled again. "See, this is really what I meant. It shouldn't be this awkward, this hard, to talk about more serious stuff. I think we are kind of stuck." Tilting her head, Elizabeth silently pleaded with him to understand where she was going with this. "We said that we wouldn't let the marriage thing change anything, but…"

"…but now it has…," John nodded.

"Yes," she continued, looking down at the table, "because now making fun of it seems to be defining our whole relationship. I would like to think that we are more than that…"

"We are," he quietly agreed.

She looked up again, searching for agreement in his eyes. "Friends?"

"Of course," he nodded. A fraction of a second later the familiar mischievous spark lighted up his eyes again, "So what you are saying is that in the future you would like for me to tease you about all sorts of things, not just about us being married?"

"Yes," she smiled softly. For here it was again – he never failed to do everything in his power to meet her half-way. Happy about the tension being relieved, he fell into a slouch again and grabbed for his sandwich. In the ensued peaceful silence he took the opportunity to really look at her. The setting sun was shining into her dark hair, creating highlights in it that he had never noticed before and suddenly her green eyes seemed so soft and deep that he couldn't shake the feeling that if he looked into them for too long, he would drown. And he couldn't get over the fact that it was because of him that she was here now and it was because of him that she looked so unusually serene and he wasn't really sure what he had done to deserve this or how he could hold on to this, but right at that moment it felt like maybe the victories in his life would end up balancing the failures out after all. Though his mind told him that there was really no justification for his feeling so possessive about her happiness and well-being, some other, more important part of him seemed to overrule it. He couldn't remember whether he even knew before that it was possible to feel so strong and so submissive at the same time.

"What do you see?" she suddenly asked, shaking him out of his reverie.

"I see that you are not eating," he answered, hoping that getting caught hadn't made him blush. And at the same time avoiding all kinds of analysis over what exactly he had been caught from. Elizabeth's first reaction was to say that she wasn't hungry, but then she realized that, this time, dinner really was about more than the food.

"So, now that we have decided that it is ok to really talk about things," she said, after swallowing her first bite, "you are really not freaked out about the fact that you are apparently capable of enough self-destruction to drink yourself into oblivion and marry a complete stranger?"

John coughed a piece of bread out of his throat and slipped his fingers though his hair. "You really have the most marvelous way of easing into things, you know that?" he asked, obviously trying to buy some time. She just shrugged.

"All right," he conceded. "No, I don't think that something that happened once, today ten years ago, is any indication of some kind of tendencies. And I really think that you shouldn't either. Though I guess you really can't help it."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well, in the spirit of our newly-found bluntness and open communication, I can, I suppose, freely point out that you are not that good with relinquishing control." He supported his head on his fist and eyed her carefully. She might have started this, but there was still no telling how far she was willing to go.

"If you are referring to the way I run the city…" she frowned, trailing off in the middle of the sentence.

"No, I am referring to the way you run your life, Elizabeth," he said, and she might have taken offence at his presumption that he knew her so damned well, but she had never really seen him smile so… tenderly before. And she forgot, instead waiting for him to go on. "Sometimes the most important thing is not to stay calm and objective and find the sort of solution that would irritate everybody as little as possible. Sometimes it is important to blow a fuse. Yell and break stuff and lose control and pay tribute to all the things that are fucked up in your life, cause sometimes that's the only way to put them behind you."

It was highly likely that he was right so she didn't put much effort into her objections. "So you think that there might be situations where what we did is justified?" she just asked.

"No," John shook his head. "I highly doubt it. It's not really constructive to solve problems by creating new, potentially bigger problems." He was quiet for a moment, coming to a conclusion. "But I understand how it came to this. At least in my case."

"Your divorce?"

"Yeah," and his fingers combed his hair again. "It was a mess. Talk about losing control…"

"What happened?" she didn't even know why she was asking these obviously painful personal questions.

"The saddest possible thing," he glanced at her and even his smile was suddenly sad. "We ran out of love." It sounded so simple and at the same time so heartbreaking, the way he said it and she realized that in order to mourn the end of an emotion this way, he must have really known it. "We couldn't hold on and we couldn't figure out where we lost it so we just had to set each other free… Anyway," he took a deep breath in, "it was ages ago."

"In my case, I think it was that one last-ditch effort to fit in," she mused, suddenly feeling that she was sharing John with something, someone that she didn't necessarily want to share him with. Because yes, their past, mutual or separate, was the reason they were sitting here now, the reason for the turkey sandwiches and that appropriately inappropriate tie John was wearing, but that distracted tender smile of his, before it turned unexpectedly introspective and sad, she wanted to think that that was about the present and maybe a little bit about the future and hopefully about no one else but her. And she knew that it was dangerous to think this way but it seemed to her that this constantly shifting dynamic of their relationship had already taken so much of her that it was only fair she got to claim a bit of him in return. "My last attempt to be like others before I was that 25-year-old with a PhD and the constant pressure to change the world." She rubbed her eyebrow remembering the somewhat juvenile frustration. "It had always been… you know, faster and higher and… more with me and for just that one moment I wanted to know what it would be like for it to simply be…"

"Average?"

"Yeah, maybe," she contended after quickly mulling that word over, "though "average" sounds a bit like "complacent", doesn't it? It doesn't matter anyway. It was pretty much immediately clear that I would fail miserably at being normal."

"And it has now turned out that you were even less average than you thought, hasn't it?" he asked, and even without looking at him she could tell that he was wearing that smile again.

Rubbing her brow once more, Elizabeth answered, "I doubt if any of the others left Vegas that Sunday married to a stranger and not even aware of it…" She looked up at him and the appreciation for the absurdity of the whole narrative that she found in his eyes made her realize that there really was no chance they'd actually ever stop making fun of their accidental marriage. Because most of it didn't even warrant a rational, not to mention a serious, conversation. Still holding on to the eye contact, she watched a thought forming in John's mind.

"Elizabeth, we are ok," he finally said, and for once the frown creating creases to his forehead wasn't apprehensive, but rather a bit shy, a bit self-conscious. "I mean, as far as being married to a stranger goes. We, at least, are not in danger of losing anything. There are so many places where marriage and everything that goes with it is just a business deal and so many people never find out that there can be so much more to it than just depending on the other person for your very survival; that life can be about more than meeting your end of the bargain."

"Not everybody has space in their lives for love, John." For some reason she was defensive.

"That is a bullshit excuse, I'm sorry," John shook his head. "It doesn't take much more space than it creates, really. The real sad truth is that not everybody can afford it. Love is a luxury commodity. So if you happen to be one of those few that can, it would be cynical to settle for anything less." And though she had come to expect, sometimes somewhat warily, almost anything from him, she hadn't expected this. She had somehow thought that his passions were more prosaic.

Elizabeth tilted her head, giving him a confused smile. "Wow. I think I could show you a long list of people who would never have believed that I would marry a romantic…" After a moment, she added, under her breath, "Of course, most of them were convinced that I would never marry at all…"

John's grin was wide and proud. "I guess I am a romantic, but I think my brand of romanticism represents a very pragmatic approach to life."

"How is that?"

"Well, I believe that happy people have easier lives." He leaned back in his chair, lifting a challenging eyebrow.

She never could resist simplicity. "It's hard to argue with that."

"Speaking of that marriage of yours," he perked up after a moment of thoughtful silence and she decided not to mind that his transition was not quite as smooth as he seemed to think it was, "and the silly mess that it has created, I think you at least deserve to cash in some of the perks that come with it. It would suck if it passed you by as if it never happened and never meant anything. And seeing that I am the one responsible for this…"

"Come on," it was now Elizabeth's turn to cut in, "I think that at least this once we could agree to share the responsibility equally."

"All right," he allowed amusedly, "but seeing as I am the one in the position to do something about this – I believe you are owed a wedding dance, Mrs. Sheppard." He stood up and reached out his hand to her.

"John, there is no music," she suddenly felt a burning urge to look away, look anywhere but at his face but didn't allow herself to do that.

"Isn't there, now?" he indicated out to the sea with his head. And she heard – the rhythmical swishing and lapping of the sea, sometimes in crescendo, approaching and crashing against the city walls, sometimes dying down into diminuendo, a gently swinging melody…

"Oh," Elizabeth let out in awe, almost not even noticing how John took her hand and lifted her from her chair, pulling her up against him. He laid his left hand on her hip and held hers in his other palm, pressed against his chest. Almost without any coaxing from her brain at all, her right hand slipped first to his shoulder and then, somehow, inexplicably, to his nape. And they were dancing, silently, while the sun slowly dropped deeper and deeper behind the horizon. She didn't question any of it, the closeness or the unspoken rhythm, because maybe he was right, again – after never letting herself despair over all the trouble the discovery of this connection between them had brought, maybe she did deserve a little bit of… this. Whatever this was… She didn't question it when, a little while later, looking her deep in the eye, John lifted their joined hands to his shoulder and deposited her palm there so that he could slip his other arm around her as well.

But she did know, as surely as she knew anything, that some things were too good, too big, to be able to stay in the moment they were born. When he laid his chin to the top of her head, she pleaded with her own reason to grant her a few more moments of this abandon. But, the next moment, feeling his lips on her forehead, the jolt down her spine that it caused, she knew that the time was up.

"Since we already established that you're the romantic, I guess it falls upon me to be the sensible one," the eyes that looked up to him were big and dark and the wording of her sentence a lot lighter than her tone and he couldn't really even regret the fading of this moment because somewhere in his mind he must have always known it would come, must have thought that it would come much sooner. Because it felt like he had won, regardless. It had never been his goal when he issued his challenge, he couldn't really remember having any goal at all. But the evening had ended up sealing all the gaps in their relationship and, as certain as he was that she would walk out of his arms the next moment, he also knew that there was no turning back now. And though these kinds of inevitabilities usually terrified him, this time, for some reason, he felt oddly comforted by this certainty instead. Her answer to his next question, issued from the doorway, only solidified his impressions.

"You are not going to disappear on me now, are you?"

"Too late for that."

TBC


	5. It killing me

"Do you have a moment?"

She looked up from her laptop, to see John poking his head through the doorway of her office. He was dressed more casually now, having discarded his uniform jacket, but from the wild mess of his hair she deducted that he hadn't made it back to his quarters yet.

"Yes, sure. Did you forget to mention something at the debriefing?" She watched him saunter in and close the door behind him, indicating that he considered whatever he wanted to discuss confidential.

"Not exactly," John mumbled, standing a bit hesitantly in the middle of the room, his fingers fidgeting with something in his BDU's pocket. "I…"

And this loss for words made it clear to her that whatever this was, it was personal. It was about her and John and she was not quite sure if the fact that this time there was no mischievous glint in his eyes, that this time he was awkward and serious filled her with more dread or less. Sometimes she wished for nothing more than for him to just leave it alone, so that she could happily go on pretending that this was all just a game, that it wasn't real. At others, waiting for him to come home, imagining all that he was coming in contact with out there, hearing his teammates tease him about this or that renowned beauty that had become smitten with him, she was tackled by the completely inexplicable fear that maybe it wasn't real for him. Now she just closed the lid of her laptop and waited for him to gather himself.

"I got something. For you… Well, for us, really. I just saw them at a stand in the market and I realized that this is another thing you don't have that you rightfully should – that one tangible piece of marriage to keep nearby. And these, well, these just somehow seemed perfect for us." He pulled his hand out of his pocket, revealing a little blue drawstring bag. Walking around the desk to stand next to her, he first loosened the string of the bag, then took Elizabeth's hand into his, turned its palm up and emptied the contents of the bag there.

She was left staring at two rings, simple golden wedding bands, one slightly larger than the other. They were not the usual kind she was accustomed to seeing – these were delicately narrow and their texture was not shiny but softly matted. And while her brain was still capable of coherent thoughts she surmised that she completely understood why John would have considered them perfect – she had never seen wedding rings that were more… private, intimate, than these. She brushed the fingers of her other hand over the rings and was sure that her eyes were playing tricks on her when it seemed as if the rings were interacting with each other, reassuring each other that without one the other would not exist.

"These are beautiful," she sighed, looking up to see a relieved smile playing on John's lips. "But I can't…"

"Way ahead of you there," he announced, drawing a piece of black string from his other pocket. "I know you can't wear it like that. And it's not like we're even…" he hesitated again, covering it by picking the smaller ring from her palm, quickly and expertly attaching the ring to the string with a slipknot. "I just thought that there should be a ring." He arched his brows, asking for permission and she gave him a barely noticeable nod, getting up from her chair in the process. It was as if some sort of a daze had taken a hold of them both, the intimacy of that private ceremony the gaps of which they were now fulfilling, step by step. They didn't even notice how exposed they were to possible onlookers through those glass walls of her office.

John reached his hands behind her neck and blindly tied the ends of the string together there, fingers brushing slightly against the sensitive skin at her nape and through her wavy dark hair while his serious eyes stared deep into hers. And she didn't know whether it was the touch on her neck that made the shiver shoot down her spine or that promise, almost a commitment in his gaze, but by the sharp exhale through his nose she realized that he was aware of that treacherous physical reaction of hers. Slowly he pulled his hands back and the quick intense glance he gave to the ring now hanging somewhere near her neckline elicited another shiver. Raising his gaze to her eyes again, he smiled and the slight undertones of primeval and possessive in his look made her frown a little – was he pleased at her reaction or had she just unwittingly allowed him to somehow brand her? Was a positive answer to either of those options a good thing?

He then took the other ring, making her fingers clasp her palm at the loss of the emotionally heavy load and, to her enormous surprise, started to slip it to his fourth finger. Before she even quite understood what was going on or what she herself was doing, she laid her palm over the fingers in which he was holding the ring.

"You are going to wear yours?" she asked, really trying to understand his reasoning.

John's eyes were glued to their touching hands, the contemplative furrow heavy on his brow. "Yeah, I think I need to...," he sighed.

"You need to?" She hated it when people repeated her own words to her in question form, but right now there was no other option. She had to know.

John sighed again, obviously at a loss for words that would describe what he was thinking and a fleeting accusation that he couldn't have possibly thought that he would get away with this in front of her without offering some kind of an explanation sprinted across her mind. "It's easy here on Atlantis," he began, already on a defense, as if having anticipated her silent accusation. "It's easy to know what to do, how to interact with people... Out there it is sometimes confusing. I think this might help me to remember... to know..." There was a helpless plea in his eyes when he turned them to look into hers again.

Damn, damn, damn, went through her head. Too heavy, too scary… did I somehow give myself away? "John, I can't ask you to stay true to... this," she gulped, suddenly feeling that she was standing too close to him. "I mean, if you find someone, I don't have any right to..." Realizing that she was still holding on to John's fingers, she quickly let go. John's face was marred with confusion.

Another puff of air came rushing through his nose as he jumped to explain, "Oh, no, that's not what this is about. That is not even an issue."

"Then what?" she frowned again, forcing herself to remain calm.

"It's about where I belong," and suddenly it was as if a calm came over him, his smile tender and serene. "Who I am… If you want, I can take it off when I'm here." The peace he had found in himself was having a wondrous effect on her as well.

"I trust you." She did. She had for a while. At least since he had pointed out how unfair it had been to not trust him.

"You do?" He tried to be self-deprecatingly amused, but couldn't really hide that his relieved surprise was sincere.

"I do," Elizabeth nodded. "I know you can be discreet."

He nodded, acknowledging her approval and resumed the act of putting the ring on, when she stopped him for the second time.

"John, wait..." Her eyes were filled with anticipation and dread and he had to marvel at her ability to completely throw him with just one look.

"What?" he asked, having frozen in mid-movement.

She took a few deep breaths, as if to give herself time to adjust to her resolution. "I think I should do that...," she finally announced, taking the ring from John. Concentrating heavily on keeping her hands from shaking, she slipped the ring on his finger, looking up once her fingers had found their target. She didn't know about her promise, the one her eyes had given him in return, but he did. And suddenly his whole life seemed backwards and upside down to him so that he couldn't tell the beginning from the end or quite put his finger on when the swell in his heart had begun (it sometimes seemed that it had always been there…), but he resolved not to question things that made him feel this good.

It feels like a ceremony that should end with a kiss, he thought, and yet he didn't dare to make a move, feeling like he had travelled miles already while still standing here, in this office.

Not quite knowing how to acknowledge the moment herself, Elizabeth slumped back into her chair and absentmindedly opened the lid of her computer. Her eyes didn't really see the screen, but neither did they see John next to her –the whirlwind of entangled thoughts and emotions in her head was claiming all her attention. John supported himself against the corner of her desk and thoughtfully fidgeted with the ring on his finger, trying to figure out what wearing it really meant and how much it changed the way he saw the Universe and the way the Universe saw him and, coming up with nothing useful, decided that this called for a longer observation period. From the corner of his eye, he noticed that Elizabeth was absentmindedly fingering her ring as well. Or is it my ring? he thought and suddenly the question of what else was his completely jammed his mind. Noticing his breathing growing heavier next to her, Elizabeth raised her head from her reverie.

"What is it?"

"It's killing me that I can't remember…," he slowly said, eyes sliding up and fixing themselves on the corner of her lips.

"Can't remember what?" Elizabeth asked, trying to ignore the tingling under her skin that his intense stare was producing.

Without warning he grabbed the arms of her chair and swung it around 180 degrees. For a moment she was facing the metal wall of her office but then he stepped in front of her and bowed down and the high back of her chair was hiding them completely from the outside world.

"If I ever did this," he murmured, leaning his face so close to hers that his hot breath seemed to burn her skin. "If I ever got to taste you…," and then his lips were touching the corner of hers, soft and tender and warm but oddly sure of themselves. The pressure eased for a fraction of a second, only to resume again a millimeter closer to the center of her lips. Feeling lost and caught off guard and falling, her hand involuntarily reached up to grasp the front of his shirt tightly for balance, quite possibly dragging him closer in the course of it, while her eyes snapped closed. She opened them again when she felt the loss of his touch and then reality came barging in, cold and unforgiving. She released his shirt, using the same hand to push him further away and had he really kissed her and had he really done this here in her office and why did she ever trust him and oh God oh God oh God…

Once she had pushed him far enough to be able to stand up without brushing against him, she started to make her way to the door of the office, trying to make her frantic getaway at a measured non-suspicious pace. Just in case he was thinking of stopping her, she reached a warning hand behind (not daring to look at him) and made a sound that was supposed to warn him to stay put. And when she had reached the balcony and the door swished shut and she was still standing there alone, it seemed that he had received the message and the implicit order.

But a moment later he was there as well, looking all worried and flushed.

"Elizabeth?" he carefully prodded, taking tentative steps closer to her.

"John," her voice almost broke and she rubbed the bridge of her nose with her knuckle in frustration. "What were you thinking?"

"Admittedly, not much," there was something raw in his tone and she noticed that he didn't even bother to be defensive anymore, "but I know I was not the only one…"

She breathed in, trying to control the debilitating shiver, apparently a byproduct of his unprecedentedly looming presence. "Anybody could have seen us there…" she squeezed out.

The snort of laughter he let out was painfully tense. "That's your beef? Not the fact that we almost kissed? Again?"

"Not "we", John," her mouth was a tight line, "you."

"Right," his tone was laden with sarcasm. "It was all me. Damn, Elizabeth, we've been dancing around this for…"

"John, you can't always be right," she announced, unusually loud, to drown out the inconvenient, completely unacceptable truth in his words. "Just because you want something and you have managed to convince yourself that you deserve it doesn't make it right..."

"What do you feel?" he asked, impossibly quietly, especially compared to her agitation.

"What?" she frowned, instinctively leaning closer to him to hear, realizing too late that this was exactly what had been his intention.

"What... do you... feel?" he repeated, his voice nothing more than a deep growl, a breathy snarl. For a fraction of a second they got stuck in each others' gaze and then her palms were grasping his jaw and she dragged herself up while dragging him down closer to her and when their lips met her body molded to his as well. Her pelvis was tightly pressed against him and his hands quickly slipped around her to fix her there, grind her closer. It was as if there were several kisses packed into one, as if they both wanted everything -- raw desperation, tender care, the heat from the friction, the tastes and the smells and the slippery warmth of tongues and hard pain of teeth and more and deeper and nothing but -- at once. And then, almost at the verge of suffocation, she extracted herself from him just as harshly as she had been drawn in and looked at him with eyes accusing and dark and confused.

"What difference does it make what I feel?" she blurted and the next thing he heard was the swish of the balcony door and she was gone. And he couldn't understand whether the world was moving unnaturally quickly or if he himself was stuck in some time loop. As soon as he had gathered himself, his hand moved up to his ear.

"Elizabeth!" he roared into his earpiece. He heard a click and then static, realizing that she was listening to him, but probably didn't dare to actually speak. "You're my wife! It makes all the difference in the world!"

He heard the heavy thump of her body slumping against the door. So, that's how far she got…

TBC


	6. No regs in the world

A/N: _I know that some people have had questions about the progress of actual episodes of the series regarding episodes of this story. To clear up that confusion -- they're not. Unless I specifically say so, this story should, I guess, be treated as an AU. That being said, there are some turning points in the show that are interesting to look at through this looking glass that I have created. And, due to this, I can reveal now that everything up to here, this chapter included, takes place before The Storm/The Eye._

**6**

"Do you want to come back out here?" John sighed the question into his earpiece, audibly calmer now. "Cause, if you are feeling anything like I am," and he tried to insert an encouraging smile into his voice, "then a few breaths of fresh air will do you a world of good…"

He heard the familiar swish and then she was standing at the doorway, hair flying into her face with the draft, looking defiant and almost girlishly hesitant at the same time.

"Hey," he said, suddenly knowing that everything would end up being alright. Elizabeth winced, still clearly drawn. The memory of her desperate aggression just a moment before flashed through his mind. She wants me, he realized. She is one of the strongest persons I know and she wants me enough for that strength to almost crack. And that realization filled him with awe and pride and a burning need to show her that all this was worth it.

He was next to her in just a few steps, cupping her face tenderly with a palm on his hand, laying a soft kiss on her lips and then when she didn't protest, didn't flee, deepening the kiss but still keeping it light and undemanding. And even if he did feel joy for her helpless response, the way her face angled itself towards him, the way her mouth moved to envelope his, the light burden of her hand supporting itself on his hip, he didn't show it. This wasn't a power play, this was a beginning of something big and beautiful.

"Sorry," he whispered a moment later, his forehead leaning against hers, still sensing the confusion in her as she struggled to calm her breathing, "but we needed a proper first kiss. That other one," he couldn't help a half-smirk, "was many things, but not a first kiss. It felt more like a last…" She glanced up at him, giving him a faint smile and the grasp of the ridiculous lengths he was willing to go to in order to earn that smile suddenly took his breath away. He absentmindedly combed his fingers though her hair. "And I am also sorry about yelling. It's just that you have this annoying tendency to walk away before I manage to gather myself enough to respond to the situation…"

"John, you're the one who creates these situations…," Elizabeth finally sighed, peeling herself away from him and turning around so that his face wouldn't distract her thoughts, wouldn't kill her resolve. "You are always interrupting and interfering and pushing us towards that point from where there is no return." She wiped her palms across her face in helpless frustration. "Why do you have to keep doing it?"

"I guess all these marriage jokes we made are getting to me," he made a feeble attempt at humor. "It is starting to feel…"

"Don't," she whipped around again. "Don't say that it is starting to feel real."

"Why not?"

"Because it can't be, John." It was as much a plea as it was a statement. "It's enough of a mess just as it is…"

He took a deep breath in, trying to put his finger on the exact nature of the problem he was having with what she was saying. Certainly, when he had assured the General that this was a non-issue, he had believed it. And, for some reason, at that point it had been important that the events of that fateful night ten years earlier had lost all their relevance. But, right now, he had trouble remembering why it was so important for them to keep resisting this thing between them.

"You do realize that there's no regulation in the world that would forbid married people from being together, don't you?" he finally asked.

"That is hardly the point, John."

"I know. I just wanted you to see that the unconventionality of our situation doesn't only have negative sides. If we hadn't accidentally gotten married ten years ago and these feelings for each other started to pop up now, we'd really be screwed," he said, smiling the smile she knew he saved just for her and she had to close her eyes for a second to concentrate.

"You're assuming a lot," she finally said, squinting at him for emphasis. "It still doesn't mean that this," she waved her hand aggressively, "won't get us into a lot of trouble."

"I know that too," John nodded. "But not for being in…" Elizabeth raised her finger to his lips and shook her head furiously. "Fine," he gave in, yanking his head back. "They can still only blame us for not telling them we were married. Not for actually acting like we are."

There was a certain kind of desperation in her eyes and now that he was actually winning the argument, he realized that he didn't really want to be. Whatever happened to this not being a power play? All he had wanted was to set her free to make her own choices. John watched her turn around and walk to the edge of the balcony, gripping the railing and staring steadfastly out to the sea.

"I'm sorry. Again," he said, smiling bashfully.

She turned her head and looked at him over her shoulder, eyes misty and serious. "For what?"

"I don't want to force you. I just…" He made his way next to her, grasping the railing as well. Elizabeth's eyes never left him.

"What _do_ you want, John?" she asked, after a moment of quiet.

_You_, he thought, wishing it was only that simple. The ring was still hanging on the black string around her neck and he hoped that it wasn't just because she had neglected to rip it off. As much as he wanted to grip her shoulders and somehow fix her in place, make her stay and listen and trust in what they had between them being real and right, he knew that the only thing he could give her now was a choice.

"I want you to think about this. And this time I want you to think about why we can and not about why we can't and I want you to bear in mind everything that I have said here tonight and also the fact that I am here. And I will be here. And there's nothing in two galaxies that is going to change that. Not even you." He raised his hand and gently wiped the backs of his fingers along her jaw line.

"I'll do that," she replied, absentmindedly taking his hand into hers and pressing it against her cheek. "If you'll think about where it is that you really want this to go. Maybe then you'll understand… I need you to be rational about this. Like you once used to be. I can't afford to have you on the other side."

-x-

"I didn't realize you were married."

Of all the inconvenient times, John thought, continuing to clear the heavy brush off from their path. It was probably the way he was holding his machete, above his head and in his left hand so that he could keep clutching his P-90 with his right that had done him in. Of course, McKay, coming right behind him with his path all smoothly cleared up, would let his eyes wander and pick up on the wedding band he was wearing.

"Yes," he pressed through gritted teeth and whacked another bush out of his way, "I am."

"No, it's just that," Rodney babbled on obliviously, "I am sure I would have noticed you wearing that ring before. Got hitched to some village girl?"

"Are you serious?" John came to a halt without warning, causing Rodney to stumble into him.

Raised eyebrows, a dramatic shrug and a high-pitched "What?" were all he got in response to the death-glare he was trying to send in Rodney's way.

"No, Rodney," he finally replied with an exasperated sigh. "In fact, I have been married for quite some time now." And, hoping the conversation was over, John went back to whacking the brush, with a little more purpose than before. The silence got them about ten meters further.

"You left your wife back on Earth, knowing that there's a chance you'd not be able to return?" Rodney wondered aloud incredulously, answering himself, before John had managed to come up with something that would have had the appropriate amount of sting. "Well, that would certainly account for the absence of the ring before – guilty conscience."

"I did not. Now would you please shut up!" Shouting at McKay might have been a bit of a lowbrow response, one that would certainly come back to haunt him at some point, as it only served to feed into his already quite firm belief that scientists and soldiers on Atlantis were separated by about a hundred IQ points. But beyond scare tactics and evasion, he really had no answers to give his teammate. And, barring physical violence, he had no deterrent against McKay either…

"Then the only optio…," Rodney's next hypothesis was cut short by another halt in their progress. John turned around, almost snarling.

"Which part of "shut up" remained unclear to you, McKay? Might I remind you of the sharpness of this metal object I am carrying here?" And just to demonstrate, he went to swish it through the air and cut off a branch right next to McKay. The latter yelped and threw John a painfully accusing look. Which would never have worked, except John knew that he was gravely overreacting. "I just thought that maybe you would like to take the lead for a while," his voice was still rough, but the hostility had all but disappeared. "It seemed to me that you were getting a bit bored back there."

"Oh," Rodney relaxed. "No, you go ahead. You seemed to be getting the hang of it quite well…"

And they continued in silence, making slow but steady progress, hopefully away from the hostile village and closer to the saving Stargate. Rodney had been smart enough to drop the subject, but now it was John that couldn't seem to let go. He realized that he had to have known that these kinds of questions would come up sooner or later, if not from the general public then at least from his teammates, the people he was working with closely. And if he now didn't have an answer to them, he had nobody else to blame but himself. Even if it was very tempting to lay it all on McKay and his obtuseness.

"It's complicated," he finally said.

"The brush?" was the question he got from behind him in return. Maybe it was too soon to rule out McKay's obtuseness.

"No, Rodney. My marital status. It's complicated."

"Oh, ok," Rodney acknowledged. Another few steps and, "Wait, what does that mean?"

"It means that, yes, I am married and no, I did not leave my wife back on Earth, but those are about the only definitive facts I can give you. If there are some further clarifying developments, I am sure you'll be the first to know."

"As if I didn't have more important things to consider than your secret Pegasus marriage," Rodney mumbled in response, but at least this seemed to be the kind of answer that gave his line of thought some sort of closure. For the time being. There might, indeed, have been more important things, but if there was one certain thing about McKay, it was his brain's ability to multitask.

John, however, was far from closure. Elizabeth had asked him to think about things and this seemed to be as good a time as any to try and do that. Her comments about her needing him to be rational and on the same side with her were irrelevant – as far as he could see, this had nothing to do with rationality, or, for that matter, irrationality. The feelings were there and acknowledging them was just a nice gesture along the way, but not acknowledging them didn't, wouldn't and couldn't make them go anywhere. And he would never be on any other side but hers, no matter what that side happened to be. Even if that side turned out to be torture for him.

A more important question was where he wanted their relationship to go. Admittedly, it _was_ one he hadn't given much thought to before, most probably because there was that pesky fact of them being married. There didn't seem to be any other place for it to go than there. But then again, there was a reason why people, as a rule, didn't get married within hours of meeting each other and, sometimes, no rhyme or reason to relationships not working out. He had to concede that he did understand why her concern was justified – just because they happened to be married, didn't guarantee a happily ever after for them. Could they keep their working relationship from completely falling apart if their personal one did?

Suddenly the image of Elizabeth, looking over her shoulder straight at him came up in his mind with a force that almost knocked him back. It was the image of her concerned and struggling against him, but all it did was remind him of how he felt every time he was near her. And every time she was out of reach. It might have been irrational, but then again, even she couldn't argue against the logic of happier people having easier lives. He now felt mildly insulted by her question – she should have known him enough by now to realize that he'd not settle for anything less than all of her.

He was not going to beg, not going to push or blackmail her (he wasn't that man and, he was pretty positive, that was not the man whose ring Elizabeth was carrying). But neither was he going to let her give up that easily.

He had all the time in the world to wait her out.

As long as he first managed to make it to the gate and home to her in one piece.

TBC


	7. The best that I've got

A/N: _So, this chapter picks up somewhere between the last two scenes of The Eye. Consider yourself warned, spoilerwise and so on..._

**7**

"What the hell?!"

There was a chilling vibration in her voice. In her whole demeanor, really.

They had moved to a small storage unit right off the control room that had been taken into use as an auxiliary office. The city around them seemed to sigh every once in a while and shift heavily to adjust to the gusts of wind and water still beating down its sides, but somehow they had gambled everything and won and the postponed acceptance of that was still hanging heavy all around them. Or maybe it was the wayward remnants of all that electricity that had just been galloping down the hallways. He looked at her, baffled, and could barely see her through the wall she had thrown up around her.

"Excuse me?"

"Of all the stupid, irresponsible…," she hissed impatiently and he could almost physically feel her wall starting to bear down on him. He reeled, ignoring the cold fist that was clamped around his heart.

"I'm sorry – you are angry at _me_?" Was this bad dream ever going to end? "The sick bastard breaks into your city, takes you and Rodney hostage, threatens to kill you, leads me to believe that you're dead, holds you at gunpoint and you are angry at ME?" His voice had been rising throughout, leaving him wide eyed and breathless by the end.

"You're damn right I am angry at you!" Elizabeth leered at him in indignation. "John, you're supposed to be the military head of Atlantis, not Wyatt Earp! You can't go around taking on foreign armies singlehandedly. Especially when I am incapacitated. What if they had gotten you too? Who would have been left to take care of Atlantis?"

For a moment he thought that he had lost the ability to speak, but then, feeling the slow burn rising up his earlobes, John realized that he was just on the verge of explosion. "Are you kidding me?!" he almost yelled when he remembered how that was done and suddenly his world was a narrow strip with her in the middle and edges flaring up in red. "There was nobody else here and even if there had been – you can't have honestly expected that I'd just leave you there…"

"And when he made you believe that I was dead?" she asked, sending a cold shiver down his spine. "You were not acting as my second in command, John. You were letting this whole marriage thing get to you." Her tone of voice was icy, icier than ever before and that was what finally convinced John that none of it was real, not even the wall around her. In a minute he would find a way to poke a hole in this illusion and it would all fall apart and it was his job, in whatever capacity, to deal with it. But Elizabeth's ability to shut herself away so thoroughly also scared the hell out of him.

"I know that we have been doing a number of things backwards here," John drew his eyebrows together so tightly that they seemed to be forming a sharp triangle, "but if you think that I love you because of this," he threw up his hand and grabbed his ring forcefully in between the fingers of the other, "then you are even crazier than I ever thought." Easing the tension in his forehead slightly, he fixed his gaze deep into her eyes. "This," he continued, voice almost hoarse from the pent-up emotions, still holding up his ring-bearing hand but slipping the other in between the wedding band she was still wearing on a string and her heaving chest to hold the golden loop lightly on his palm, "is because I love you!"

The electrified silence that ensued was finally interrupted by her almost gasp-like question, "You love me?"

"Of course," John squeezed through his teeth. "What do you think all this agony has been about for the past months?" And he did realize that he probably sounded angry. "I've tried to tell you a thousand times, but you never let me…"

"You love me," she sighed, and he could actually see the realization sink into her. The eyes that looked up to him now were impossibly huge and full of delayed terror. "I'm alive…," was what she said next and he understood exactly what she felt, almost as if he was feeling it himself.

"Yes, you are," was all he managed before the blinding pain made it all the way from his gut to his throat, sealing his vocal chords shut.

"John, I'm alive…," it was now almost a whimper and all he could do was reach out his hand and pull her to him, into a desperate feverish kiss. A series of violent shakes jolted their way through her body, grounding into him. They were both alive, but it was going to take much more than this to make any of it alright. Considering from the way she clung to him, fingers clasping at his shirt first, then his shoulders, then gripping his nape, drawing him as near to her as possible, that's what she was thinking as well.

His hands were hopelessly tangled into her hair, still rough and sticky from the wind and the salt and their kisses were salty too and somehow that slight bitterness felt right. There wasn't anything sweet and soft about the recognition of the fragility of everything around them, the glib way Fate seemed to have for picking out the very pieces that held it all together and yanking them out without any penitence. At the memory of the moment when everything around him seemed to go black John's lips latched on to Elizabeth with even more determination to ward off the sudden wave of vertigo and the next thing he realized was that what he was tasting wasn't just even saltier, but also wet. Leaving his hands to hold on tightly to her head, he pulled his face far enough from her to clearly focus on hers and bore witness to the huge silent tears flowing down her cheeks. For a fraction of a second all the tension in him gathered into a stone-hard ball in his chest and then he felt a big part of it just whizz out of him, leaving him soft and numb at his knees – he had never been that relieved to see a woman cry.

(Meanwhile, neither of them noticed the face that glanced casually in through the small round window in the door, vanishing for a fraction of a moment only to reappear, huge blue eyes almost pressed against the glass.

Equations as prosaic as putting two and two together had always been tricky for McKay, he was well aware of it. The trouble was that his brain solved problems like those automatically, without even letting him know it was happening. Rodney was a man of bigger pictures. Details that made up these pictures had never been his strong suit – details, after all, were already there, the challenge was to orchestrate them to march to his tune. Now, witnessing John holding up one hand and sliding the other under the pendant hanging on the black string around Elizabeth's neck, he was thus reduced to gasping, "It's her! It's… them!" And the next moment the window pane blackened out in front of him. On an impulse, he tried to push the door open, only to discover that it seemed to be welded shut.

For a moment he just stood there, palm splayed on the metal of the door and eyes narrowed in confusion, but then he caught on to what was going on. Throwing his head back, not sure quite where to direct his indignation, he howled, "Oh, come on! That's preferential treatment!" Turning his head, his complains ensued, "I also have the gene now, you know!" Nothing happened. "Way to go… Titanic!"

Suddenly, realizing how ridiculous he must have seemed, he shrugged, "Great, now I am talking to a metal construction," and pursed his lips. "Oh," he went on a second later, eyebrows shooting up, "and now I am talking out loud to myself… Excellent!" He shook his head and walked away, in search of something to eat.)

"I'm so sorry…," she mouthed in a broken whisper, averting her eyes, but he could only think about the irrelevance of it all. He slipped his index finger under her chin and lifted it so that she would witness him dismiss the whole world around them, understand his priorities and the inevitability of them.

"No," and now John was forced to blink heavily to push back the stinging in his eyes, "it's all finally over now, 'Lizabeth." Her name almost disappeared into his deep relieved exhale. "I've got you, love," he murmured and, sensing that her legs were about to give out under her, pulled her into a crushing embrace, one hand making soothing circles on the back of her head, the other holding on tight to her waist. "I've got you," he almost absentmindedly repeated, lips pressed to her temple.

The pieces started to slowly slide back to their rightful places – there was finally some order and sense in his world again. She was molded into him, smelling of rain and sea and pulsing life. He would have gladly stayed in that very position forever, surrounding her wholly with his own body, but the adrenaline that had been pumped into him by the terror and the desperation – the fear that he would be too late or that one of the infinite string of snap decisions he had had to make would be crucially, fatally wrong or that, when he finally got to look her in the eye, there would be nobody left in there but a complete stranger – was starting to seep out, taking all his strength along. So, mustering the last of it, he picked her up and, supporting his back against the wall for leverage, slid them both down to the floor.

They stayed still for a moment, pressed into each other. Elizabeth's head was resting on his shoulder, her warm breath blowing against his neck. John had one arm draped around her waist, the nook of his armpit creating a backrest for her and the other resting casually over her thighs, fingers drawing idle circles on her hip.

"John, I'm a complete ass…," she finally heaved a sigh, still not making a move. "I'm so very sorry… Oh, God…," she now wiped her palm across her forehead and into her hair in frustration, only to get her fingers stuck there immediately. "There are no words that could tell…"

"Shhh," he whispered, pulling her hand into his and lifting it to his lips. "It's ok."

She languidly shook her head, "It's not." He could feel her swallow. "I knew you'd come. I knew all along." She now intertwined her fingers with his and let their joint hands drop to her lap. John's eyes were fixed there, mesmerized. "I have never counted on anybody this much, John… Never been as sure in anyone as I was in you tonight…" Even lifting her head was an effort, but she did it, needing to see his face, needing to see if he understood any of what she was saying.

The moment of their interlocked gaze stretched out, leaving them to cast about for words that would make all of it hurt less. Memories of those minutes when everything was lost were tearing a bloody gash into his heart and he had to close his eyes to gain some control over them. Elizabeth leaned in and pressed kisses on his eyelids, now willing what was left of her strength into him. And for the first time he allowed those memories some meaning, allowed them some leeway without the fear that this would just give them the opportunity stay to haunt him for the rest of his life.

"When he said you were…," his voice was hushed and raw, catching when he reached that word and he dug the fingers of both his hands deeper into her, keeping his eyes still shut, "…gone… It felt as if everything in me that was human had gone with it… I couldn't stop, I couldn't allow myself to…" In his mind he was running and running and running, barely making the difference between the pounding of his own heart and his feet against the metal floor of the city. And he didn't know if the deafening roar was coming from his throat or if it was just the sound of his brain shutting down. It was Elizabeth's lips moving against his eyelids that finally managed to bring him back to the present.

"I was afraid that I'd gotten you killed…," she murmured. "I was afraid I'd lost you. I think that's why I was behaving like a lunatic before."

"You'd gotten _me_ killed?" His eyes snapped open and he slid his head back along the wall to look at her, bewildered. "I was the one… I _am_ the one who is supposed to keep people safe here. _I'm_ the one who failed." His gaze glassed over for a fraction of a second – the image of everything that mattered to him being dragged towards the glowing circle burning itself into his soul – the paralyzing terror pushing his wife into helpless resignation, his robotic tunnel-vision: from his gunsight to the target in the monster's shoulder inches to the left of her, the need to catch her…

"But you didn't," Elizabeth brushed her thumb down his spiky stubble-covered jaw line and, when his gaze cleared and flicked up to look at her, a shadow of a smile fell across her features and it was the first time in a very long time that either of them had smiled. "We're here, John. We're alive." She stopped, holding her breath. "I've got you, too." She shrugged and he thought he saw a new kind of a glow in her when he tilted her head and said, "We've got each other."

John's arm slid up her back to let his palm cup the back of her head and bring their mouths together once more for a brief fiery kiss. "We do, don't we?" now it was he who was smiling, forehead tipped against hers. Her arms snaked around his neck, fingers playing idly with the short silky hair at his nape.

"I thought Atlantis would keep you safe, Elizabeth," he sighed, some of the pain still lingering in him. "I don't know how I'm ever supposed to let you out of my sight again…"

She inhaled heavily, "I think we should postpone dealing with that issue for the time being." John's forehead wrinkled into a question mark against hers. "For now we've done all we can for Junior," she smirked, indicating with her eyes that she meant Atlantis by that. "Let's go home, John. Let's get some sleep."


	8. I'm feeling alive

**8**

"… and that goes for you too, Rodney," they heard Teyla say when they entered the control room.

There was a deep frown on Rodney's face when he turned his head, readying himself to snap his gaze back on Teyla for a counterattack, but then he noticed John and Elizabeth instead.

"Great, you're here!" he charged immediately. "Elizabeth, would you please tell them…"

"Oh, shut up, Rodney!" the completely uncharacteristic sigh escaped Carson's lips, a clear sign of his overflowing exasperation. Elizabeth looked from Carson to Rodney to Teyla (quietly giving bonus points to Ford for wisely steering clear from this debate), eyebrows raised.

It was Teyla that finally decided to elaborate as to the causes of this disagreement. "We were discussing how to proceed. There is not much point in starting to bring people back while the storm is still raging out there."

"At least on this we agree," McKay hissed. "The lightning conductors are still disengaged so we can restore power only to a fraction of the operational part of the city. According to my estimates, the storm should start to dissipate in seven to eight hours."

"So," Teyla continued when it was clear that McKay had finished, "we thought that the wisest course of action would be to take turns keeping watch until then. It does not seem to be necessary for all of us to stay here." She looked at the leaders of Atlantis for confirmation, obviously not wanting to overstep her competencies.

"You're right," John sighed, regret filling the look he gave Elizabeth. "I'll take the…"

"No," now it was Carson who stepped up. "Both of you," his lips were pursed as he pointedly looked from John to Elizabeth, "will now go and get some rest. You have done quite enough. And that also applies to Dr McKay."

Rodney's shoulders tensed and he let out a frustrated puff of air. "As I already explained," he pointedly swung his gaze between members of his audience, batting his eyelids dramatically, "I have to monitor the…" Indignation and exhaustion were making his voice gratingly whiny and Elizabeth decided to spare her tired ears and quickly waning patience.

"Rodney, what are the odds of another Apocalypse descending on us within the next hours?"

"It is not a matter of life or death, if that's what you're asking, but…" McKay shot, readying himself for a lengthy self-justification that nobody was really in the mood to hear.

"Yes, that was exactly what I was asking," Elizabeth nodded. "You can take the second shift, Rodney." John had to marvel at her ability to convey such authority even when her legs were obviously about to give in from exhaustion. He made a mental note to get her out of there as fast as possible. Right then, all he could do was take advantage of their usual physical proximity to each other (there was nothing more usual than him standing right behind her) and place his palm at the small of her back for support without the others noticing it.

"Fine," Rodney conceded and the fact that the bitter undertone was now barely noticeable in his voice was as clear a sign as any that he, too, was actually about to keel over from exhaustion. "I'll be back in an hour," he still managed to hold on to his independence.

"Two," Carson stated.

"Right," Teyla concluded, having closely followed the whole exchange. "Then it is settled – Dr Beckett and I will take the first shift. Lt Ford and Rodney will come to relieve us in two hours and Dr Weir and Major Sheppard will take the third shift. After which we should soon be able to start getting people home."

"Great," John sighed, took firm hold of Elizabeth's elbow and turned to leave. "Let us know if something fun comes up."

"I have restored life support at the area where your quarters are situated, Elizabeth, so that should mean heating and water," Rodney proudly announced to their retreating backs.

"Excellent!" John shouted without bothering to turn around.

Ford's demand to be explained why he was automatically excluded from the first shift and Teyla's subsequent quip about the urgent need to send him and Carson to their separate corners allowed John and Elizabeth to leave without hearing Carson muse, "But the Major's quarters aren't anywhere near Elizabeth's…" to which Rodney simply noted, "After tonight, I wouldn't be so sure about that."

**X**

Having made it out of the control room, John slipped his fingers through hers, pulled her hand up quickly and automatically to touch it against his lips and admonished, "And you were afraid there'd be no one left to take care of the city – they didn't seem to need us at all back there…" Noticing her half-amused wince he asked, "What? Too soon?" getting a full smile out of her in response.

She took a shower first, keeping it short despite the overwhelming desire to stay under the hot cascade of water forever, not only because of the looming danger to just fall asleep there on her feet but also because John was waiting for his turn outside. Just the mere thought of him suddenly had the odd and slightly disconcerting effect of making her breath hitch and though she most likely knew exactly why that was she was way too tired to start to give a name to that feeling just yet.

He had stripped down to his boxers while he waited, laying his clothes (that he, if Elizabeth's feelings towards her own rain soaked uniform were any indication, most likely wanted to burn instead) into a neat stack on her desk chair and suddenly she felt unexpectedly possessive towards that wiry strong man with a wild mess of hair, a shadow of a stubble and the unmistakable mist of sleep in his eyes. Just when he started to move past her towards the bathroom, she reached out her hand, hooked her fingers behind his jaw and drew him into a brief hot kiss.

The only thought he had when he saw her exiting the bathroom was that he was the luckiest bastard in the universe just to be standing there. Her hair was in combed dark wet curls and she was wearing an old oversized t-shirt that fell just under her buttocks, making her legs seem to last forever and then she looked at him with that glint in her eyes that seemed to be saying that he was the only thing in the world that mattered and then he was lost.

He heard her sharp intake of breath just before her lips landed on his and, the next minute, bunching the fabric on the back of her shirt tightly into his fists, he had the fleeting thought of how much he loved the way she had of kissing with her whole body, leaning into him with her breasts and her pelvis… And then she briefly touched her forehead against his and let go, pushing him in the direction of the shower. And he noted how his body was all restless and tingly from the contact but way too drained to do anything about it.

When he came out again she was already asleep. He took in the dark hair spread out on the pillow and her milky white shoulders poking out from under the covers and then made his way to the bed himself, climbing between the sheets as if it was the most natural thing to do. She had taken off the t-shirt, he realized when his chest made contact with her bare back, belatedly realizing that this obviously also accounted for the milky shoulders. Scooting closer to her and laying his arm across her waist to draw her tightly up against him, he knew why she had done it – her warm skin against his was the firmest, most soothing reminder of the life that was still within their grasp, still coursing through their bodies and humming in their ears. The last thing he registered before heavy sleep consumed him was the deep sated breath she let out in her slumber.

**X**

He had no idea how long he had been sleeping when he suddenly jolted awake, at first only aware that something had startled him back to consciousness, then slowly also taking note of his budding hard-on and the fact that his palms had found their way to cupping Elizabeth's breasts. Which was probably what had prompted his wife to arch into him, pressing her butt against his groin and her head into his shoulder. Which, he realized, must have been what woke him.

A quick glance at the numbers glowing green on the screen of her bedside clock confirmed that he had slept for only a little more than an hour, but the unquestionable stirring in his body was an obvious sign that it had been enough. Where he had previously been forced to admit that the rough night had taken the man out of him, leaving behind only the fleeting helpless desires and emotions, it seemed that now the man in him was sufficiently restored to eagerly want to prove himself and that realization left him feeling both slightly embarrassed and perceivably proud. A still sleepy grin dragged its way across his face as he laid a soft kiss to the point where her shoulder became her neck and whispered a raspy, "Morning…"

"Mmmm," was the response he got, along with an agonizing squirm and then Elizabeth turned her head and reached out her hand, slipping her fingers into the soft hair at the back of his head and pulling his mouth to hers. Her eyes were still closed but he could feel her lashes fluttering against his cheekbone, a sensation which caused him to sharply inhale through his nose and deepen the kiss. He wrapped his arms all the way around her and Elizabeth slowly turned her whole body in his embrace, never breaking the kiss. She finally opened her eyes when she was lying half on top of him, carefully placing her knee in between his legs so as to not crush his obvious erection.

"Morning," she grinned, leaning up slightly to look at his face. The room was still dark, darker than it should have been according to the clock, probably due to the storm that had started to dissipate a little, but still seemed to be going strong outside. His palms were making slow circles on her bare back and she raked her fingers through his hair that seemed to be springing out in all directions. The soft touch sent a shiver down his spine and he had to close his eyes for a second.

"How are you feeling?" he asked when he opened them again.

"Better," answering in whisper, she pressed a quick kiss to his lips. "Alive," she added, after a short pause.

"Good," he smirked up at her in his familiar lopsided way which made Elizabeth throw back her head in silent laughter. The pendant on the string around her neck swung dangerously in front of his face. He lifted his hand and caught it.

"You're going to put my eye out with that thing," he snorted, biting his lip. "How am I supposed to explain that to my subordinates?"

She stilled for a second, looking him pointedly in the eye. "I think there are other places where we might be able to store that thing," she arched her brows and yanked her head so that suddenly he was holding the ring in his hand and the string was hanging limp from his wrist. Elizabeth shifted, supporting her body on her right elbow and raised her left hand up, fingers spread. A slight suggestive tilt of her head was enough to dispel any ambiguities he might have had. Willing his hands to be steady, he dragged the ring out of the knot that tied it to the string and slipped it to her finger and then, unable to think of any other way to express the emotions of the moment (unable to think of much anything at all, really) pulled her mouth to a long sloppy kiss.

The issue of possession didn't really bother her anymore. She wasn't going anywhere any more than John was – if there really was one person out there for everyone, this man was hers. Continuing to wear his ring hidden under her clothes would have indicated that she was somehow ashamed of this, ashamed of her feelings and the man she was feeling them for when she really couldn't have been more proud. She saw it now – everything that was just between her and John, in these quiet private moments when there was only the two of them, was incredibly clear and simple. And at that moment, when they were pretty much the only people on the whole planet, that was all that mattered.

John shifted their bodies so that she was suddenly pinned under him and, arching up again as she felt his mouth latch onto her nipple, her last almost coherent thought was about the advantages of accepting a man's wedding ring while almost naked and in bed with said man and how logistically convenient this made sealing the deal.

**X**

"I suppose if we don't show up on time, McKay will hold it over us forever?" John sighed, pressing a regret-filled kiss on Elizabeth's shoulder blade.

"Plus, seeing as they have allowed us the longest time to recuperate, it would just be a nasty thing to do." She sat up in bed and threw him a smirk over her shoulder. Of course getting up wasn't even debatable, the slight whininess was just their way of paying tribute to the moment. Mustering the necessary amount of determination, John stood up, yanking his boxers off the floor and up his legs in the process. He threw a disgusted glance at his clothes on the chair.

"I would give anything not to have to put those on again. Ever," he indicated with his chin. "You think it would be too obvious if I just borrowed some of yours?"

"Considering how unflattering my uniform is, I doubt anyone would even notice…," she replied, fishing her own discarded panties out from under the bed. "Anyway, I think the dead givaway will be the fact that you smelling of my soap."

John took a long sniff of his arm and grinned. "Mmmm, yeah, the potent combination of rose petals and sex."

"Well, at least it's the proper marital kind, none of that pesky bitter aftertaste of sin," she snorted, pattering over to him and giving him a peck on the lips. John quickly slipped a hand to the back of her head and drew her in for a proper kiss.

"No, certainly nothing bitter here, Mrs. Sheppard," he murmured against her mouth.

"That's Doctor Sheppard to you," placing her palms against her chest she pushed herself off him, smirking. "The time, John." she tilted her head towards the clock to hurry him along. John sighed and started to get dressed.

He was done long before Elizabeth, who had to search for a clean set of clothing first. Glancing around, he saw the tree he had given her for their anniversary perched on a ledge near the window. It seemed to be doing well, the leaves a deep rich shade of green. The surprising touch was how Elizabeth had chosen to add to it – there were several white ribbons tied to the branches.

"What is up with the tree decorations?" he asked, walking up to the plant and fingering one of the ribbons. Elizabeth looked at the tree thoughtfully for a moment and then gave a wistful smile to John.

"I tied one on every time you made it back," she explained, biting her lower lip. The missing "alive" and "to me" were loud and explicit in her demeanor. John quickly counted the ribbons. Four. Not many, but definitely too many. Now that he knew exactly how she felt all those times when she had no way of knowing whether he was alive or dead, whether she would ever see him again, he also knew how pointless the excuse of this being part of his job was. Dying wasn't any more part of his job than it was part of hers and in any other circumstances, finding out that she had worried this much even when she fought against her feelings for him might have been flattering. But here the danger was real and imminent and the thought of being the source of such heartache for her was gut-wrenching.

"Hey," she stepped up to him, placing her hands on his hips. "It's ok. We're here now. And it's not like you were keeping me in suspense on purpose."

"I'll be more careful," he promised.

"No, you won't," and her smile was both encouraging and pensive. "This is our life, John. It's dangerous and it's unpredictable and sometimes damn unfair but it's also more and better than we could have ever hoped for." She quickly swiped her palm over his cheek. "Right now, right here, I cannot think of a thing I would change about all this." He gave her a small smile, stroking his hand through her hair. "And don't you dare worry about me when you are out there," she finished. "If you get distracted I'll be even more concerned. Now, it's time we got going."

Looking up at the door, John sighed and asked, "Do you want me to go first so we wouldn't arrive together?"

"Nah," nose wrinkled, Elizabeth shook her head. "No stupid games today. We can go back to all that tomorrow."

There was suddenly a mischievous glint in John's eyes. "Yeah, I am with you on that one," his voice was colored with held-back laughter, "except there is one thing that I neglected to do yesterday and it is imperative that it gets done as fast as possible…"

"Oh, now what?" She sounded at once amused and wary.

"Come," he simply instructed, turning her around and pushing her towards the door. Once they had both made it out, he stopped and suddenly picked her up. Elizabeth's arms flew automatically around his neck, even as she raised a sarcastic brow and asked,

"John, are you sure we are not taking this doing things backwards thing a bit too far? I mean, you push me out the door so you could carry me back into my own quarters after we have made love?"

"I'll have you know, my love," he heaved her back into the room and set her down, "that I have always considered doing things in their so-called proper order for pussies!"

Elizabeth wiped her palms down across his chest, looking up at him in mock admonition. "Yes, the words one really wants to hear from one's second-in-command." John's lower lip pushed out in a pout. Unable to resist, Elizabeth stretched up and kissed it lightly, and suddenly she was looking him in the eye, serious and tender.

"John, I want you to know," she said, cupping his cheek, "no matter how this all pans out – I do love you. Never forget that."

TBC


End file.
